2006 Knowledge Bank Rich Picture Case Studies
Cranbourne Secondary College - Choice: The Year 9 Program
Name: Hilary Baxter
School: Cranbourne Secondary College
Postal address: Stawell Street, Cranbourne, 3977
Telephone no: 5996 3544
Email: ba@cranbournesc.vic.edu.au
![[img] Thumbnail image - Cranbourne Secondary College](../images/baxter_cranbournesc.jpg)
Year
9 at Cranbourne Secondary College
"We are teaching a brand new Program at Year 9. The changes are vast
compared to what we had before.
We've got a massive new learning centre so kids are not confined to a small space with with 25 kids and one teacher. Now we've got between 40 and 50 kids with two or three teachers."
Case study focus
Cranbourne has begun a new programme for Year 9 in 2006 with whole school change as a priority over the next three years. The focus is on changing pedagogical practice to enhance learning outcomes, and to increase engagement and connectedness to school.
Year 9 now runs in 5 large groups of students with three teachers allocated to each. Traditional subject labels have been replaced by three core learning areas: Think, Investigate and Create. Classes run in 100 minute blocks. Students have more choice in and control of their learning. We want to share the results of our change process.
What aspect of best practice will be the focus of the case study?
Team teaching and the use of ICT are at the core of the programme and would be the focus for the case study. We aim to increase the use of ICT as a learning and teaching tool and to develop our teachers’ capacities to work collaboratively rather than in isolation. The focus will be on the ways in which our teachers learn to incorporate ICT into their classrooms and how they learn to develop their team teaching skills (this practice is entirely new to our staff). On-going professional development, in-house, is they key strategy for building our teachers’ pedagogical repertoires.
How does the case study intend to showcase or demonstrate best practice?
The case study showcases best practice through its open documentation of
the learning that is taking place. Teachers can’t improve their pedagogical
practice without professional support and the study will demonstrate how
the college is encouraging staff to find news of engaging students in their
learning. The change in pedagogical practices is causing change in Key Learning
Areas (KLAs) and the boundaries are being expanded. We are also working
with Dr Julie White from the University of Melbourne Education Faculty and
she is supporting our reform process through her own research project.
The form of the case study
The final product will be a video documentary incorporating interviews slideshows and animations. We will create a streaming video version along with a higher quality product that will be available to download. Input to the final product will be derived from a variety of sources.
Download the movie below:
- Choice: The Year 9 Program [Quicktime Movie 26.5MB]
- Choice: The Year 9 Program [WMV 25MB]
What multimedia and/or online tools have been used?
The tools will be a mobile multimedia recording unit that will include
a laptop, video camera and digital camera. This will be used by each group
to quickly setup a recording studio so that data can be recorded for editing
at a latter date. We will edit the final product using the
Apple ILife software on the Apple
platform.
Engagement and benefits
The case study is made engaging by using teachers in real classroom and professional development situations. Teachers being interviewed offer themselves and their experiences openly and honestly.
Content will driven by teachers’ own voices and stories as they record their own learning.
The teachers, students, whole school and wider education community will benefit from the case study as it will be shared with colleagues across a range of leaning communities. As a demonstration of teachers developing practice the study will serve as a model to teachers and as motivation to develop best practice. The study will contribute to the reform agenda of the Blueprint in 2 ways; it will provide and document significant opportunities for professional renewal of our teachers by demonstrating teachers increasing their professional knowledge and therefore enhancing their professional engagement and practice. It will also provide engaging documentation of students being provided with more opportunities and better outcomes through improved pedagogical practice.
